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Community Resilience and Good Ageing: Doing Better in Bad Times

This two-year research programme funded by the Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) seeks to optimise outcomes for communities and older people in the context of adverse, natural events by integrating models of Positive Ageing with models of Community Resilience.

It addresses two unavoidable realities: NZ’s ageing population and its unique exposure to seismic and extreme weather events. In less than two generations NZ will have 1.35 million people aged 65 years or more. Their wellbeing will be critical to the economies of local communities. But older people are physiologically vulnerable and ten to live in areas exposed to adverse, natural events. Around two thirds of NZ communities are at risk of severe adverse natural events. By 2051, one million over 65s will live in vulnerable communities.

When dwellings fail to protect in adverse events and are costly and difficult to restore, older people can end up in costly, high dependency care and often never regain independence. Their communities lose people who make a critical social and economic contribution.

This research seeks to optimise both community resilience and good ageing by testing how public, private and community services and institutions can foster older people to help themselves and their communities to manage and recover from adverse events.

This research programme is now complete.

Over the course of the programme the research team, with the help of many developed a set of practical tools. The tools along with research findings, presentations and reports are all available for download from the programme website. A selection of publications has also been included here on this site.